ISIS inspired Truck Jihad hits Stockholm

In Sweden’s capital, Stockholm, a truck rammed into a departmental store near the Bharatiya Embassy on Friday. Four people were killed and several others were injured in the attack. There were also reports about shooting near the place of the incident.

The attack happened in Drottington Street, a crowded area of Middle Stockholm. The tragic incident took place near the same place where a terrorist had exploded himself in 2010. Islamic State (IS) is suspected to be behind the attack.

According to Swedish radio, the truck caught fire as it entered the departmental store. People began to run away from the spot of the terrorist activity. An eye witness Jane Granroth said, “I was in a shoe shop, when the loud noise was heard and suddenly the people started shouting. When I looked out of the shop, a truck had entered the store”.

According to a local newspaper, the truck used for the attack was of a beer company, that was stolen in the morning.

The prosecution said that the police arrested a person on Saturday for activities related to terrorism. According to the police, this person was seen near the spot in the CCTV cameras.

The main suspect in the truck rampage, identified as a 39-year-old man from Uzbekistan, turned out to be a rejected asylum-seeker who “applied for a permanent residency permit in 2014,” Police Chief Jonas Hysing told reporters.

“The Migration Agency rejected it in June 2016 and also decided that he was to be expelled. In December 2016, he was informed by the Migration Agency that he had four weeks to leave the country.”” Hysing added.

The suspect ignored the notification and his case was transferred to the police to execute the deportation order, but the man “went underground.” Apart from that, the suspect expressed radical ideas and “showed sympathies for extremist organizations, among them Islamic State,” Hysing added.

Courtesy: Dailymail.co.uk

Rakhmat Akilov, 39, reportedly told police that he carried out the attack on the orders of Islamic State. He allegedly said: ‘The bombings in Syria must stop,’ a Swedish newspaper reported.

Akilov has allegedly confessed to the attack and told investigators he was ‘pleased with what he had done’ and had ‘accomplished what he set out to do’, it was claimed. He had earlier expressed support for Islamic State and world-wide extremist group Hizb ut-Tahrir, whose UK members included jailed hate preacher Anjem Choudary.

Police sources said a bomb, found in the truck but which failed to detonate, contained gas canisters, chemicals and nails.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has also condemned the attack by tweeting.

The attack comes just a day after ISIS carried out an attack in the eastern part of the Homs Governorate, Syria. According to the Daily Express, ISIS fighters attacked a Syrian Arab Army (SAA) base there. It’s been reported that the terror group took advantage of an opportunity to attack the SAA without the fear of a retaliatory airstrike, following the recent US air strike on a Syrian air base.

Truck Jihad

It is noteworthy here, that Al-Qaeda had asked supporters in 2010 to use the truck as a weapon. ISIS also in an article published in its magazine on November 2016, suggested to jihadists how to carry out an attack as a lone wolf operative. In the article, ISIS said that a lone wolf should use a vehicle to plow into a crowd and to carry a secondary weapon.

Soon after, an ISIS-inspired student carried out vehicular attack on Ohio State University. The perpetrator, Somali-born Abdul Razak Ali Artan, also carried a machete. ISIS later claimed the attack and named Artan as one of their “soldiers.”

A similar attack claimed by ISIS was carried out on July 14, 2016 at a Bastille Day celebration in Nice, France by Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel. Bouhlel is responsible for murdering up to 84 people by ramming into them with a truck and shooting at them.

Another vehicular attack was carried out on a Christmas market that killed 12 and injured 48 at Breitscheidplatz in Berlin-Charlottenburg, Germany. More recently, ISIS claimed an attack on pedestrians on a bridge in London. The attack was carried out by Khalid Masood, 52, a middle-aged Father who converted to Islam. Three people were killed by Masood in the attack. The Islamic State also claimed this attack.

Sweden rethinks liberal, multi-cultural policy

Sweden is part of the Scandinavian block of countries in Europe which are renowned for the ‘universal welfare’ Nordic model. The country of 10 million has received about a quarter of a million people seeking asylum in recent years, before restricting inflows in late 2015.

Friday’s attack has jolted the country, and the shell-shocked PM has vowed his country will ‘never go back’ to recent levels of mass immigration after it emerged the terrorist who killed four people in a truck attack was a failed asylum seeker. Stefan Löfven pledged to change his country’s liberal attitude, insisting the massive influx allowed during the 2015 migrant crisis would never happen again.

“Everyone who has been denied a permit should return home. This makes me feel enormously frustrated. If you have been denied a visa you are supposed to leave the country,” Löfven said.

There are more than 3,000 migrants living unlawfully in Stockholm alone, police said. Here is a video which went viral on social media recently that shows 3 female Swedish police officers being beaten up by one male refugee who was suspected for arson –

Western double standards

Europe has seen the real face of fanatical Islam for just the last decade or so, and already one can see the collapse of the much-touted multi-cultural model in the Western world. Far-right nationalists are seeing a surge of support across Europe, and there is a rush to clamp down on immigration and shut borders.

The same West likes to lecture and admonish Bharat on tolerance, religious freedom and human rights. Bharat has borne the brunt of Islamist violence & European Christian colonialism for centuries. Today, we live next door to a fanatical Pakistan that is the hub of global Islamic terror, and are dealing with the problem of 20 million illegal Bangladeshi immigrants. Yet, we have been able to maintain a diverse, pluralistic, genuinely tolerant society.

If the West truly wants to combat Islamic terror, they should partner transparently with nations like Bharat, rather than play a double game with us by abetting Pakistan’s military and unleashing missionary propaganda to defame Bharat through organizations like USCIRF, Amnesty International, and various other self-styled international NGOs.

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